The Chosen Few Though Ranks Increase, Women Clergy Face A Stained-glass Ceiling

June 13, 1993|By LISA DANIELS Daily Press

In the dim light of the small brick sanctuary, a priest stood behind the altar. Holding a white wafer, the priest praised God.

The Communion ritual was the same one Jim Bennett has witnessed hundreds of times in her years as a member of the Episcopal Church. But there was something in particular she savored about this service: the priest standing before her was a woman.

"Thank God we have lived to see women take their rightful places in the church," said the 63-year-old woman. "We are all part of God's world."

More than four decades after women's ordination first was approved in a church in the United States - in 1948 for the African Methodist Episcopal Church - thousands of women are leading religious congregations.

The National Council of Churches reports the number of women clergy in the U.S. nearly doubled from 10,470 in 1977 to 20,730 in 1986, the last year for which figures are available. Religious scholars speculate that with thousands of women pursuing a clergy career since then, the number of females in the pulpit is far greater.

It didn't come without a fight. For generations, opponents to women's ordination held their ground, citing that none of Jesus' 12 apostles was a women and quoting I Corinthians 14:34 - "women should remain silent in the churches. They are not allowed to speak, but must be in submission, as the Law says."

Proponents look to Galatians 3:28 - "There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus," and argue that women should be treated as equals.

Despite the division, women in the ministry "are here to stay," said the Rev. Jean Cooley, associate to the dean of faculty at Virginia's Union Theological Seminary in Richmond. For the past decade, about one-third of students in mainline Protestant seminaries have been women, she said.

But a seminary education doesn't translate easily into a ministry career, said Reta Finger, the editor of Daughters of Sarah, a Chicago-based Christian feminist magazine.

"It's one thing for a lot of women to attend seminary, it's another thing for them to try to get a church," she said. "The hardest part is to get ordinary laypeople to accept the concept of a woman in the ministry."

The Rev. Peg Buelow, rector of St. Mark's Episcopal Church in Hampton, remembers how when she arrived at one parish, a few of the members flatly told her they had to get used to having a woman in charge, down to the sound of her high heels clicking down the church hallway.

The Rev. Augusta Boyd "Miki" Vanderbilt, associate pastor of Newport News' Hidenwood Presbyterian Church laughs when she recalls the reaction visitors to her church have when they see her at work.

"I get the comments like, `Hey, I have never seen a woman in that role before; you were OK,' " she said.

In her dissertation on laypeople's attitudes toward women clergy, Loretta Mueller, a Newport News licensed professional counselor, discovered that after their churches hired a woman minister, congregations had a less positive attitude toward women clergy than they had before.

That could reflect the unrealistically high expectations people have in general about clergy, she said.

"What I think is happening with younger clergy is that they are getting more clear about drawing lines saying `I'm a human being and I'm drawing limits' and people get real crazy about that."

Many of the Rev. Tracy McNeil Wines' congregants in years past had reservations when they learned a woman cleric would be assigned to their United Methodist Church. Once they met and got to know her however, they welcomed her.

"They discovered that I don't have horns and fangs," said Wines, who has felt supported by the members of Poquoson's Trinity United Methodist Church in her three years there. "I'm a normal human being engaged in ministry."

Though increasing in numbers, with some even ascending to the level of bishop in their church, many women clergy complain of a "stained-glass ceiling," which they say keeps them from getting larger congregations and high-profile positions in religious institutions.

The Rev. Doloris Borum said two churches refused to ordain her simply because she was a woman.

"I was told that woman couldn't do the work of the ministry," she said. "This isn't right."

Borum finally was ordained by First Baptist Church, Denbigh, in 1981. Soon after, she launched her own nondenominational church. Today, York County's Faith for Living Outreach Center has nearly 200 members.

"It hasn't been pleasant, not being accepted," said Borum. "The church has been slower to adapt to this change; I can't understand why."

Finger, the editor, said the laggard pace at which women have advanced in their ministries reflects a resistance to change.

"I think there is a sense of the conservative nature of religion coupled with the idea of biblical authority," she said.

Many Roman Catholic women, who cannot be ordained priests in the church, feel they have to create their own opportunities to fulfill their "calling" to God's work.

Though she has no aspirations to enter the priesthood, Carolyn Lawrence, who recently stepped down as campus minister at Christopher Newport University, said it can be "frustrating" for Roman Catholic women not to have the opportunity to be ordained as priests.

"We have seen many more women in decision-making roles but we are nowhere where we need to be," said Lawrence, who served at the college for 11 years.

"It all boils down to bigotry," she said. "Do I think that's ironic? No. I think it's human. The church isn't God, it isn't perfect. "